The Brotherhood (The Eirensgarth Chronicles Book 1) Read online

  She relaxed slightly when she recognized the stranger who was just down the creek. Getting a better look at him now, he was of medium height and stocky, with close-cut dirty blond hair. His pale skin was blemished with several dry, scaly patches. As she approached him warily, still gripping her hairpin, she saw his deep-set pale blue eyes, the color of the sky after a rainstorm. A proud, defiant chin and strong, clean-shaven jawline strengthened his expression.

  The man looked at her, smiled a jagged-toothed smile, and waved. He sat on a log dangling a thin fishing pole over the water, teasing several small brook trout.

  “’Morning!” he said cheerfully. “Oh, wow, that eye is looking downright demonic, isn’t it? But I trust you feel a little better after that hibernation?”

  Paige nodded, watching him. He noticed her sizing him up and let out a haughty laugh.

  “There’s nothing to worry about, missy.”

  “It’s not missy. It’s Paige,” she muttered, reinforcing her stance, “and I’m not worried.”

  “No, of course not,” he said with a hint of sarcasm sprinkled onto his tone, and winked. Paige felt her cheeks flush. She sat on the bank about five feet away from the young man, tightly clutching Klaíomh. He chuckled.

  “Who are you?” she demanded. “Where am I?”

  “My name is Robert, or Eöl, if you prefer Elvish. You do speak Elvish, I assume?” He gestured to Paige’s ears and she self-consciously touched one.

  “A little.”

  “Sort of what I figured.” He laughed. “As for what you’re doing here, well, I snagged you out of the woods and brought you to Glimmerglass Creek in the southern edges of the Wild. You were, eh… well, pretty banged up.”

  “It was a long night,” she muttered, feeling emotion well up in her throat.

  “I’ll bet,” Robert said quietly. An awkward moment of silence ensued as he continued to fish. Paige couldn’t quite decide what he was. Though he could pass for a human, his ears were slightly tapered, but not as angled as those of an elf. Instead, they curled downwards. His teeth were slightly jagged as well—in fact, almost pointed.

  Finally, Paige worked up the courage to say something. “I suppose I owe you some thanks,” she began, looking the hermit in the eye. He snorted in amusement, but his expression grew soft and he smiled.

  “No worries. I didn’t do much more than provide a bed.”

  “Well, it was very kind, all the same. I feel as if I’ve been run over by a buffalo.”

  “I can’t say I’m surprised.”

  “Last thing I remember was running into someone and then this blinding pain before I went unconscious.”

  “Oh, yeah. Sorry about that. Broadside gets a little ham-fisted when he gets startled,” Robert muttered.

  “Broadside?”

  “A friend of mine. Can’t blame him, though, not like he’s used to running into sprinting women at three o’clock in the morning.”

  “What on earth were you doing in the middle of the Wild at three-thirty in the morning?”

  Robert shifted uneasily in his seat.

  “Nothing of consequence.”

  “Is that so?” Paige demanded, crossing her arms.

  “Indeed,” Robert said, as if that were the end of it. He teased the hook and worm he held in the brook a bit before continuing.

  “How do you like the clothes?”

  “It was most generous of you,” she replied. Paige shuddered thinking that two men got her out of her other clothing and into a nightshift. As if reading her thoughts, the stranger piped up quickly.

  “Also, just so you know, I was able to get that nightshirt on you over your other clothes, so your modesty is intact,” Robert said, somewhat sheepishly. “I figured it beat hypothermia.”

  “I appreciate that,” Paige said, still not sure if she believed him, but his slightly embarrassed look seemed genuine enough. He had stepped out to give her privacy earlier, so she decided to give the young man, or whatever he was, the benefit of the doubt. Robert smiled, but a jerk on his line distracted him. He pulled the line out of the stream. A shimmering green river bass nearly twice the width of Paige’s hand splashed onto the bank. Its scales glistened in the late morning sun like emeralds in the side of a mountain.

  “Best get on to breakfast. You must be starving after all that time you spent unconscious,” he said, rising. Paige realized that her stomach was indeed gnawing at itself like a dragon clawing its way out of a cave.

  “How long was I asleep?” She thought about the attack and wondered how many nights could have passed while she had been out cold.

  “About two days,” he replied, leading her up the stone path over the side of the valley to the hermitage. She wasn’t too surprised—she must have been nearly dead of exhaustion when the stranger had caught her. She kicked a stone in the pathway and watched it skitter up to the mound as she tried to recall any other information she could remember, but she came up empty. She quickly rebraided her hair and inserted Klaíomh into the top of the plait. Then she followed Robert back to the cottage and they entered the low doorway together.

  Robert dropped the fish onto the table and began to gut it while Paige seated herself in the chair at the end of the table. He threw the fish into a pot of boiling water on the small fireplace hearth and stirred it. He stood a while, stirring in silence save for the sound of his wooden spoon scraping against the sides of the iron cauldron. Paige glanced about for a way to be helpful. She noticed a small pile of scrawny-looking vegetables on the hearth.

  “If you have a knife I can borrow, I could peel and dice these for you,” she offered.

  Robert eyed her warily, a sly grin sliding onto his face. “Promise you won’t stick me with it?”

  “Of course,” she said, irritated. She held her hand out expectantly. The young man fished out a small paring knife from the drawer beside the hearth and handed it to her. Paige seated herself in one of the gnarly kitchen chairs and began peeling the carrots one by one, dicing them in turn and making a tiny mountain in the center of the table.

  They worked in silence for a few moments, Paige letting the monotonous task of dicing the carrots lull her into a trance of her own thoughts. She hated carrots, but Mother had grown them in her box garden. Her mind wandered from the garden to the events of three nights before, the memories as clear as if they had been moments ago. She could hear the creaking of the old rope as her father had clutched on for dear life, the fibers snapping one by one, dropping him to his doom. Paige bit her lip, trying to keep from sobbing again. Should she have taken that rope? Was there another rope nearby she could have used instead? All the scenarios poured through her mind, but they all kept coming back to one theme, one singular, nagging thought that cut deeply into her very soul:

  This was all your fault.

  “Two?”

  Paige looked over at Robert. “Excuse me?”

  “Two scoops?” the young man asked, holding up a ladle and a bowl. The warm smell of fresh food hit Paige’s nostrils and sent her stomach to aching like a broken heart. She nodded emphatically, the spicy aroma making her feel faint and slightly nauseous. Robert ladled her a bowl and garnished it with the raw cubed carrots as he handed it to the starving princess. Seconds later she had the bowl all but licked clean.

  “Easy there, tigress, there’s more where that came from!” He laughed.

  Paige dabbed her mouth with the corner of her handkerchief gingerly. “I apologize,” she mumbled as Robert dumped another batch of the stew into her tankard.

  “Think nothing of it. You had a long run and a long few days sleeping it off. You need as much strength as you can get, I imagine.”

  Paige ate the second bowl more slowly, savoring each bite this time. Robert let her eat in peace.

  Paige rested her spoon neatly on the bowl’s rim. “I can’t thank you enough, but I’m afraid I haven’t anything to repay you with. All my belongings are… well… they’re gone now.”

  “This is a home, not an
inn.” Robert tsked, scooping up the dishes and taking them to a wooden barrel in the corner, scrubbing them out with a bundle of twigs tied together with jute twine. “You can stay here as long as you want or need to. I know everything’s got to be quite overwhelming right now.”

  “You’ve no idea.”

  Robert chuckled mirthlessly. “I’ve seen the Shahir’s troops lay waste before. There’s not much to walk back to and not many places to go afterwards.”

  Paige’s head snapped back to face her host.

  “Whose troops?” she demanded.

  “The Shahir’s?” Robert said again, confused. Suddenly a look of dawning realization spread across his face as he looked into Paige’s eyes.

  “You…you don’t know who the Shahir is, do you, lass?”

  Paige shook her head.

  “Who are the Shahir? Why did they destroy Kapernaum!?”

  “It’s ‘who is the Shahir,’ not ‘who are,’” Robert corrected, disbelief etched onto his face. “You seriously don’t know? Your father never told you?”

  “What do you know of my father!?” she demanded. Robert drummed his fingers on the table as he took a seat opposite Paige.

  “I’m getting the sense you’re behind on world politics these days.”

  Paige made a face to indicate she clearly hadn’t the slightest idea what he was talking about, and the lad sighed.

  “Okay, then, where to begin?”

  “How bout you start by telling me who this Shahir is and why he, whoever he is, attacked my village?”

  Robert nodded his ascent as he stood up, pulled a loaf of bread and a block of cheese out of the cupboard, then seated himself once more. He offered a hunk of each to Paige but she declined, too anxious to eat anything else.

  “The Shahir is a king in the east, in a far off country on the edge of the Great Sea,” Robert began. “Till the last hundred years or so, they were just another collective of city states, like out here in the Wild. But the last three kings they’ve had this century seem to feel the title ‘Emperor’ is more to their liking, and this one? He’s the worst yet. He’s been pushing his borders like none before him ever dared.”

  “And they’ve made it into the Wild now?”

  “Well, see, that’s the odd thing. The Wild has had too many pitfalls for them over the last decade of trying. They have two settlements, last I heard. One is just a small mining city in the far northeast of the Wild. I think it’s called Frang-something-or-other.”

  “And the other?”

  “That would be Aschin. It’s a fortress city they built on the edge of the Raychel Ridge that serves as their westernmost outpost. I think they finished constructing it about two years ago, but until now they hadn’t sent any kind of real army into the Wild itself, let alone as deep into the forest as Kapernaum was.”

  “I think they were after my parents.”

  “It’s the only explanation I can think of,” Robert agreed, reaching into his robe. “And I suspect it had something to do with this?”

  Paige gasped as he pulled a leather scroll from the inner folds of his robe.

  “Give me that!” she commanded, snatching it out of Robert’s hand. She felt both shocked and elated to see it hadn’t been lost.

  “That’s kind of what I figured,” her host said, stuffing another bit of bread and cheese into his mouth. “Any idea why the Raven-heads would want that little trinket?”

  “Raven-head?”

  “Sorry. Shauds. The people the Shahir rules over.”

  “Oh. No, I have no idea why they would want it. It’s just a bunch of old Elvish that I can’t even read.”

  “That’s unfortunate. I was hoping you’d have some more insight, since that’s all I could glean off it as well.” Robert sighed.

  “Well, I’m sorry I didn’t get to take the time for all that extra insight as my family was being slaughtered,” she quipped.

  “I didn’t mean it like that,” Robert said. “Whatever it is, your father felt life-bound to protect it. The Shahir must really want whatever secret this ancient text contains.”

  “But how did my papa get it? And how did this Shahir person know he had it?”

  Robert shrugged. “We may never know, but one thing is for sure: it has to stay out of his hands.”

  Paige nodded, unrolling the leather and glancing across the ancient words. She thought she could make out the Elvish words “open,” “earth,” and “guard,” but it was impossible to tell for certain. She sucked in a deep breath and let it out in a weary, exacerbated huff.

  “So, not that I’m trying to run you out, understand,” Robert added, clearing the table and scrubbing it with a semi-clean rag, “but do you know what you’re going to do now?”

  Paige sighed and shook her head.

  “No relatives? Family in neighboring villages?” Robert asked.

  “No, everyone I would have gone to was at that feast,” she whispered, the gravity of those words hitting her like a millstone being dropped on top of her. “Now they’re probably all dead.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Robert offered, his face now etched with compassion. “I wish there was something I could do.”

  “I just… I need a moment to think.” Paige kneaded her forehead.

  “I need to go weed the garden anyways. I’ll leave you to it for now.”

  “Oh, no, I didn’t mean that! I’ll go on a walk. Please don’t feel like you have to leave.”

  “Oh, I don’t. It is my house, after all.” Robert smirked. “I just better get to it before I forget, that’s all.”

  He ducked outside and headed around back. Paige sank back in her chair and rubbed her eyes, the ache in her left eye increasingly festering.

  Her mind and her gaze began to wander, her eyes once again resting on the chest at the foot of the hanging cot. It was a beautiful piece, the iron bands accenting the dark patina of the old wood. She followed the intricate carvings and scrollwork about the black bands, noticing a peculiar carving on the front of the box: a dragon twisted into a circular knot, a blade weaving in and out of the artwork at an angle. A banner beneath the design was written in a more modern Elvish than the scroll that lay on the table, and she could make out the words “Ayghrast Urrem Gaer ahl urm Ihmparhem.” “One must uphold honor for all.” She wondered if it was Robert’s family crest.

  Paige gazed at the chest for a long while before losing interest. She meandered over to the far side of the hut and plopped into the giant bearskin chair, pulling her legs up and resting her chin on her knees. The weary pull of exhaustion tugged on her eyelids like a tower-keeper tugging on a bell rope. As the minutes dragged by she dozed in and out of consciousness, her mind flashing back to the attack. Her brain felt dull as the images played through her dreams; she saw her mother lying in a pool of her own blood. Then her father lying crumpled and helpless on a deck just beyond her reach. The last image she saw was of the commander with the black turban and the white plume, standing over his dead body, a savage look of contempt and gleeful hatred etched into his bearded face.

  It was on this image Paige’s eyes snapped open. The room was nearly dark now; the sky outside had slipped into the deep blue of late twilight. Boiling anger began to build up inside her stomach and creep its way up to her heart.

  The Shahir was the ruler of the nation and the army ultimately his to command, but she doubted she’d ever get close enough to him to dole out justice, even if she could make her way to the Great Sea. But this commander, the man whose blade had pierced her father’s heart, he was still out in the Wild somewhere. He might be easier to reach. Paige wasn’t sure if she could get close enough to him to use a dagger or a sword, but if she could somehow get ahold of a bow, she might be able to kill him.

  Kill him.

  Those last two words branded themselves into her mind as she sat staring at the hearth’s glowing embers. She’d never killed a man before. The closest she’d come was the soldier she’d choked trying to protect her mother. Was she ca
pable of killing someone? She’d often asked this in her heart while out hunting in the Wild. But after the attack, she was fairly certain she would have no hesitation killing in self defence. But in cold blood? Would she be able to release an arrow into an unsuspecting target, no matter his crimes? Where was the honor in that?